Sermon Tone Analysis

HBI - The way we are to love others is revealed in God’s love shown to us and as such we are to remain in Him.

Intro

Love and Discipleship, what do they have to do with each other and why is it important.

We are looking into what our purpose is as a church.

This guides where we go because it answers the question why we do what we do.

To get everyone on board with where we re going we need to know why we do what we do.

Our purpose statement says that why we are here is to glorify God.

We went over what this looks like in different areas of our lives last week.

the rest tells us that we are to glorify God through Loving others and making disciples.

That is not just loving each-other in the church but others around us as well.

Discipleship and loving others go hand in hand.

This is why we are here, to not just tell people about Jesus but as we are going to learn teaching people what it means to remain in Him.

There is a movie I watched a long time ago called Armageddon.

Classic world is going to end movie.

A big old asteroid is heading towards earth and the US government is the only one that knows what to do so they send a bunch of oil drillers up to the rock hurtling through space to drill a hole in the thing and blow it up before it destroys us all.

Well the ragtag group they send up contains two important characters (spoiler alert) One is a father and the other is engaged to the fathers daughter and he doesn't like him.

In the end of the movie someone has to stay on the space rock and press the blow up button because the remotes batteries died and they draw straws to see who will press the magic button.

The engaged guy draws the straw but the father runs out, locks the door and says I will sacrifice my life so you can have a life with my daughter.

What a story of love, sacrificing your life for another.

I was mocking the movie a little bit but the image of a man giving his life for another in love is one that is given to us in the scripture I want to focus on the morning.

I may be jumping around in the bible for a bit but I want us to look into why we have come up with the church direction that we have.

so what does it mean to love others?

How are we to love those around us? What example do we have of what it means to love Jesus anyways?

These are some things we are going to look into today.

7-8 - The command - Love others

we start out with the command that we have, not so much a command but rather a friendly yet strong reminder.

1 John 4:7 (CSB)

Dear friends, let us love one another

John tells us right off the start that we have a command from God. Dear friends He says.

My beloved friends whom I love, we need to show love to one another.

It may say love here but our word for love does not do justice what his really means.

a universal, unconditional love that transcends and persists regardless of circumstance.

This is the definition of love that is given us here.

1 John 4:7 (CSB)

Dear friends, let us love one another, because love is from God, and everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.

So we are told that we need to love others, and that the uncondtional love that we are to show is is from God everyone who loves has been born of God.

Verse 8 goes on to tell us that if you do not love then you have not been born of God and does not know God for God is love.

but then this could mean that if we love others then that makes us a Christian right?

I mean that is what it seems to be saying here.

Just go through the motions and boom, we are a child of God.

easy peasy.

This is the problem with taking scripture out of context.

We go farther back to see if John has said this elsewhere as well to give us that same idea.

1 John 3:23 (CSB)

Now this is his command: that we believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and love one another as he commanded us.

so that is what we must do, just to be clear.

In order to be a child of God, even if we do love others means that we must first believe in Jesus as our Lord and savior.

the command that we are given as Christians, those that believe in the name of Jesus as our Lord and savior, love one another.

This is why we are here, to love eachother and love those around us that do not know of Jesus.

9-16 - God’s love revealed - This is What it looks like

But again we read that this is not just any type of love.

We are given an example of what this is supposed to look like.

Loving others is hard sometimes.

You know that you are to love but sometimes you don't like them very much.

some people are pretty hard to love.

But true love has been revealed to us and that is the example that we are to live by.

9 - God sent His son - We need to live through Him

1 John 4:9 (CSB)

God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his one and only Son into the world so that we might live through him.

God sent His one and only son into the world so that we might live.

We where lost in sin, maybe we still are lost in sin but the promise of life is seen in Jesus coming to earth.

10 - love is seen not in how we love, for we are sinful but rather in How God loved us enough to sacrifice His son for us.

The love that we are to show is not seen in how we can love on our own.

For we are sinful but rather we read in verse 10 that love is this, it is sacrificial.

The love that we are to show is seen in the atoning sacrifice that Jesus made on the cross.

some versions use the word propitiation.

It is a word that is not either used or understood anymore but it is a beautiful word.

either way what this means is that Jesus blood covered our sin.

As sinners we can not love like this it is not possible because our sinful hearts get in the way.

What Jesus did is pay for sins that where not His own, He truly loved to the point of paying for penalties that where not His own Being an atoning sacrifice meant that His blood covered our sin, if we believe in Him. to love others even when they do not believe, even when they do not deserve it, even when they have have done something to hurt us.

This is the example that we have.

Therefore we need to show this same love to one another - a sacrificial love.

We learn a bit more about the revealed love of God to us. 1 John 4:12

1 John 4:12 (CSB)

No one has ever seen God.

If we love one another, God remains in us and his love is made complete in us.

We experience the presence and character of God not through seeing Him but through the way we love others.

Because love is not seen in the way we love but through the way that God loved us.

As we echo that to those around us we experience the presence and the character of God.

God is made know to others through the way we love others.

1 john 3:24

1 John 3:24 (CSB)

The one who keeps his commands remains in him, and he in him.

And the way we know that he remains in us is from the Spirit he has given us.

this is how we know we remain in God.

Again it is not just saying, hey I am showing love to others, but rather it is through the evidence that we keep his commands as well.

It is living our life in every aspect for Jesus.

It is through God and His spirit that we can do this.

(How do we know we have received His spirit?”

14 - We are a testimony to this to the world around us, what God’s love has done through and to us.

This is another aspect of God’s love revealed in us.

we give testify as to what the Lord has done for us.

We tell people what we have done, what the Lord has pulled us out of and How He has changed our lives and we give testimony to the wondrous love of God.

15 - God’s love is revealed in those who remain in Him (but what it looks like to remain in Him has already been said)

16 - We can Have assurance of all this because we have experienced the Love of God.

What an amazing thing, to know that God’s love has been revealed to us in such a way.

His atoning sacrifice has given us freedom from our sin if we confess He is Lord and believe He is risen from the dead.

We get a glimpse into the character of God through His love.

We may not see Him ever, but we see him through the way He has shown love to us.

We can have assurance of our faith because of the love we have experienced.